Journal of Happiness Studies

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-020-00246-4

RESEARCH PAPER

Perceiving Social Pressure not to Feel Negative is Linked

to a More Negative Self‑concept

Egon Dejonckheere1   · Brock Bastian2

© Springer Nature B.V. 2020

Abstract
The current cultural standard in western societies expects people to be happy and not sad.
While the pursuit of positive emotion is strongly encouraged in modern societal discourse,
occasionally feeling negative is easily considered maladaptive or abnormal. It is in our
human nature to comply with social expectations, and the extent to which we are able to
do so has important consequences for how we view or present ourselves, generally referred
to as our self-concept. Here, we investigate how the perception of the societal norm to
avoid negative emotions relates to people’s self-concept. In an online survey (n = 98), we
assessed people’s perceived social expectancies not to experience feelings such as anxiety
or depression. We evaluated the emotional quality of participants’ self-concept via an open-
response 15-statements task in which they freely described themselves, and from which we
extracted the positive and negative emotion words using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word
Count software. We found that people’s perceived social expectancies not to experience
negative affect related to more negative and less positive self-descriptions. Furthermore,
multiple linear regression revealed that this association was independent of people’s desire
to socially conform, but a function of their actual emotion/symptom levels. Together, these
findings further support the premise that today’s societal standard to avoid negative affect
is unattainable, inevitably disclosing discrepancies between people’s actual occasional neg-
ative feelings and the desired emotion norm. Because this process is associated with nega-
tive self-evaluations, this may lead to an ironic amplification of these unwanted negative
states.

Keywords  Social expectancies · Emotion norms · Cultural standards · Self-concept ·

Negative affect

Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (https​://doi.org/10.1007/s1090​

2-020-00246​-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

* Egon Dejonckheere
egon.dejonckheere@kuleuven.be
1
KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
2
University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia

13
Vol.:(0123456789)
 E. Dejonckheere, B. Bastian

1 Introduction

Social norms greatly determine the way we behave, think and feel (Sherif 1936). In the case
of emotions, we have a general conception of how others around us evaluate the experience
of certain kinds of emotions, and how socially appropriate it is to experience or express
particular feelings (Bastian 2013). As such, our perception of these social emotion norms
introduce internalized personal reference values about which emotions to pursue and which
ones to avoid (Carver and Scheier 1990). Here, we examine how the pressure to live up to
these social emotion standards may have implications for the way we view or present our-
selves (i.e., our self-concept; e.g., Baumeister 1999; Manstead and Fischer 2001). Do these
perceived social expectancies motivate us to present a self-image that nicely aligns with the
societal norm, driven by the need to portray ourselves in a socially desirable way (Krumpal
2013), or do these stringent social expectations make us experience a discrepancy between
our actual selves and the desired social standard, inducing negative self-reflections (e.g.,
Nolen-Hoeksema et al. 2008)?

2 Literature Review

2.1 Social Norms About Appropriate Emotion

In modern Western societies, it is evident that some feelings are more socially valued and
normative than others. From brand advertisements that emphasize the instant gratification
associated with the purchase of their goods (e.g., Khanna 2016), or motivational speak-
ers and self-help books that promise effective strategies to boost people’s happiness (e.g.,
Seligman 2004), to national indexes that rank each country according to the average happi-
ness level of its citizens (e.g., Diener 2000), it is clear that there is a strong societal empha-
sis on pursuing happiness and positive affect as a source of favorable outcomes (Ahmed
2010; Gruber et al. 2011; Mauss et al. 2012).
Simultaneously, the occasional and inevitable experience of negative affect is often dis-
missed as deviant or dysfunctional (Haslam 2005), considered bad for our own and others’
mental health (Bastian et  al. 2012). Although feeling sad, stressed, angry or anxious at
times undeniably serves an adaptive purpose (Smith and Lazarus 1990), the functionality
of these negative affective states is rarely mentioned in modern societal discourse (Dejon-
ckheere et al. 2017).

2.2 Social Norms and Self‑concept

Humans are social creatures, sensitive to interpersonal processes such as social approval
and group belongingness (Baumeister and Leary 1995; Sherif 1936). As such, the extent to
which we are able to meet the perceived expectancies of other people around us, but also
society’s standards more generally, has important consequences for our self-concept (e.g.,
Asch 1956; Insko et al. 1983). Our self-concept refers to the collection of beliefs we have
about ourselves (Baumeister 1999), and constitutes our individual perception and evalua-
tion of who we are as a person (Hattie 1992). It generally embodies the answer to the ques-
tion “Who am I?” (Kuhn and Mcpartland 1954; Lewis 1990).
Adhering to social norms or standards is associated with positive self-evaluations (Pool
et al. 1998). In fact, maintaining a positive self-attitude is thought to be one of the major

13
Perceiving Social Pressure not to Feel Negative is Linked to…

driving forces to conform with relevant majority groups (e.g., Chaiken et al. 1996). In con-
trast, social non-compliance leads to (fear of) rejection, punishment, and negative self-eval-
uations (e.g., Asch 1956; Kruglanski and Webster 1991; Schachter 1951).

2.3 Social Norms About Appropriate Emotion and Self‑concept: Two Competing

Hypotheses

A critical question is how these normative processes unfold in the case of people’s per-
ceived social expectancies to avoid negative feelings and their self-concept? Will the per-
ceived social standard not to feel bad relate to self-evaluations that are more positive or
negative?

2.3.1 Hypothesis 1: Social Desirability Process

On the one hand, the societal norm to be happy and not sad may encourage people to pre-
sent themselves in an (overly) positive way, aiming to conform with the societal norm in
the most favorable manner (e.g., Krumpal 2013). As such, the perception of other’s expec-
tancies not to feel negative could instigate a social desirable response in which people for-
sake each negative statement about themselves in order to depict a personal image that
corresponds to the prevailing cultural norm (e.g., positivity bias in self-representations on
social media; Reinecke and Trepte 2014; Waterloo et al. 2018). According to this rationale,
perceived social expectancies not to feel negative are associated with self-representations
that are (overly) positive and not negative, because people feel a compelling desire to com-
ply with the social norm (i.e., social desirability process).

2.3.2 Hypothesis 2: Emotional Discrepancy Process

On the other hand, the societal norm to be happy and not sad may also be unattainable,
inevitably revealing a discrepancy between our actual emotional states and the desired cul-
tural norm (Bastian et al. 2012; Carver and Scheier 1990). Because we all feel sad or anx-
ious sometimes, we may perceive an inability to meet the socially acceptable standard of
avoiding these negative feelings, which prompts negative self-evaluations and the ironic
amplification of these unwanted emotional states (Dejonckheere et al. 2017; Nolen-Hoek-
sema et al. 2008). Following this rationale, perceived social expectancies not to feel nega-
tive are associated with a self-concept that is more negative, and less positive, because we
experience an incongruity between how we actually feel and how we think we should feel
according to others (i.e., emotional discrepancy process).

3 The Present Study

With the current research, we had the aim to test which of these two processes dominates
the relation between people’s perceived social expectancies not to experience negative
emotions and their self-concept. In an online study, we assessed participants’ perceived
social expectancies not to feel anxious or depressed, and evaluated the positive and nega-
tive emotional quality of their self-concept in a free-response self-description task (i.e.,
15-statements test; Kuhn and Mcpartland 1954). Additionally, to contrast the relative
empirical validity of the two proposed processes, we determined participants’ desire to

13
 E. Dejonckheere, B. Bastian

socially conform (social desirability process), as well as their actual anxiety and depres-
sion levels (emotional discrepancy process).

3.1 Participants

We used Amazon’s Mechanical Turk Services (MTurk) to recruit participants for our study.
While the MTurk community represents the general population in many demographic fea-
tures better than commonly employed convenience samples (e.g., first-year psychology
students; Behrend et al. 2011), MTurkers are also known to experience elevated levels of
depression and anxiety (Arditte et al. 2016). Given our research interest in the perceived
social evaluation of these negative affective states, we believe this makes the MTurk com-
munity an opportune participant pool for the current study.
Nevertheless, research indicates that MTurkers, on average, differ in other meaningful
ways from the general population (e.g., socio-economic status and education levels; Pao-
lacci et al. 2010), taming a direct generalization of our research findings to a population
level (see also our limitation section).
Based on previous research on the link between perceived social expectancies not to feel
negative and psychological well-being (Bastian et al. 2012; Dejonckheere et al. 2017), we
anticipated small to medium effects. A test for statistical power determined the inclusion of
100 participants to detect effect sizes of this magnitude (r = .30, α = .05). A group of 101
MTurkers expressed interest in our study, upon which we sent them a link to a Qualtrics
questionnaire. Three participants, however, did not complete the entire survey and were
therefore excluded from our analyses. This left us with a total sample of 98 participants (57
men) ranging in age between 19 and 69 (M = 36, SD = 11). Based on the geographical coor-
dinates in our Qualtrics data, we determined that all but two participants lived in the US.1
All participants provided informed consent.

3.2 Procedure and Materials

Our survey consisted of various self-report questionnaires (not all relevant for this report),
complemented with an open-ended 15-statements test to evaluate participants’ self-con-
cept. The order in which we presented the separate instruments was randomized across
participants, as well as the items within each questionnaire. To ensure the quality of our
data, we also included a bogus item (i.e., This is a control item. Please select ‘6’ for this
item.), which all participants correctly identified. The average completion time for the
entire survey was 17 min (SD = 8 min).

3.2.1 Perceived Social Expectancies not to Feel Negative

To evaluate participants’ perceived social expectancies not to experience negative affect,

we administered the Social Expectancies about Depression and Anxiety Scale (SEDAS;
Bastian et al. in preparation). This questionnaire is composed of 13 statements that assess
people’s trait-like beliefs about how others around them, but also society in general, per-
ceive people who experience various negative emotional states such as depression or

1
  Replicating our analyses without the two non-US participants yielded similar conclusions.

13
Perceiving Social Pressure not to Feel Negative is Linked to…

anxiety (e.g., I think that society generally disapproves of people who feel depressed or
anxious. or Overall, people in society are very comfortable with those who feel depressed
or anxious. [reversed]; for an overview of the complete questionnaire see Supplemental
Materials 1). Participants had to evaluate each statement on a Likert scale ranging from 1
(strongly disagree) to 9 (strongly agree), with higher scores indicating that person expe-
rienced more social pressure not to feel negative. Internal consistency was high (α = .89).

3.2.2 Social Desirability

We determined participants’ tendency to present themselves in a socially desirable way

with a short form of the Social Desirability Scale (SDS; Crowne and Marlowe 1960). This
instrument consists of 13 statements that implicitly assess both people’s ambition to over-
report desirable behavior (e.g., No matter who I’m talking to, I’m always a good listener.),
as well as to under-report undesirable behavior (e.g., There have been occasions when I
took advantage of someone. [reversed]). Participants rated each statement on a Likert scale
ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree), and higher scores indicated higher
levels of social desirability. Internal consistency was high (α = .87).

3.2.3 Depressive, Anxiety and Stress‑Related Symptoms

We assessed participants’ current depressive, anxiety and distress levels with the Depres-
sion Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS; Lovibond and Lovibond 1995). This 21-item
questionnaire consists of three 7-item subscales, and aims to distinguish between differ-
ent emotion/symptom clusters that are uniquely related to, and prototypical for, depres-
sion (anhedonia and absence of positive affect; e.g., I was unable to become enthusiastic
about anything.), anxiety (physiological hyperarousal; e.g., I experienced trembling in the
hands.), and general distress (being upset and increased negative affect; e.g., I tended to
over-react to situations; Brown et al. 1997). Participants rated the experience of each com-
plaint during the last week on a scale that ranged from 1 (never) to 4 (almost always). Each
subscale showed high internal consistency (depression α = .96, anxiety α = .91, general dis-
tress α = .92).

3.2.4 Self‑concept

To evaluate the positive and negative emotional quality of people’s self-description, we

adopted an open-ended 15-statements test (e.g., Kuhn and Mcpartland 1954) in which
participants were prompted to provide various personal answers to the question “Who am
I?”. Subjects were not obliged to complete the entire list of “I am …”—statements, but
we encouraged them to spend around five minutes on the task. On average, participants
provided 12 personal statements (SD = 2), with most responses constituting a single word
(median number of words for the complete test = 15; M = 19, SD = 14). We emphasized not
to bother about the logic or importance of their responses; they could write the answers as
they occurred to them.
Next, we used the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count software (LIWC, version 1.17;
Tausczik and Pennebaker 2010) to determine the emotional content of participants’ self-
evaluations. LIWC is a text analysis tool that allows researchers to quantify (among other
textual parameters) the emotional quality from written samples by comparing reported
target words with a validated dictionary that contains almost 4500 unique words that are

13
 E. Dejonckheere, B. Bastian

Table 1  Personal statements High LIWC positive emotion High LIWC negative emotion
from two example subjects with score score
positive versus negative self-
concepts
1. Smart Old
2. Hard-working Cranky
3. Honest Sarcastic
4. Perseverant Depressed
5. Likable Bored
6. Funny Funny
7. Happy Loser
8. Easy-going Lazy
9. Faithful Sorry
10. Trusting DJ
11. Reliable Promoter
12. Strong Friend
13. Helpful White
14. Independent Son
15. Supportive Broke

LIWC Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count

coded for their presence among various categories (Pennebaker et al. 2001). Specifically,
we were interested in the percentage of positive and negative emotion words in partici-
pants’ personal statements as an indication of how positive or negative they viewed them-
selves. The LIWC dictionary includes 406 positive (e.g., love, nice, sweet) and 499 nega-
tive (e.g., hurt, ugly, nasty) emotion words. Table  1 provides the personal responses of
two example participants that respectively had positive and negative emotion scores in the
highest decile of observed LIWC emotion word scores. On average, the LIWC software
could detect and categorize 85% (SD = 11%) of the reported target words in one or more
categories.

4 Results

All data in this article are available at the Open Science Framework for re-analysis (https​
://osf.io/jc453​/). Table 2 presents the descriptive statistics for each measure, as well as the
correlations between all instruments. Focal to our research question, we observed a statisti-
cally significant association between people’s SEDAS scores and the positive and negative
LIWC emotion scores derived from their free-response self-descriptions on the 15-state-
ment test. Specifically, although effect sizes were smaller than we had anticipated, subjects
who experienced more social pressure to avoid negative feelings such as anxiety or depres-
sion, reported considerably less positive (R2 = .041), and more negative emotion words
(R2 = .072) in their self-evaluations (see Fig. 1).
Second, we also observed a statistically significant correlation between participants’
SDS scores and the positive and negative LIWC emotion words in their self-descriptions.
That is, subjects who had the tendency to present themselves in a socially desirable way,
used more positive (R2 = .043), and less negative emotion words (R2 = .052) to describe

13
Perceiving Social Pressure not to Feel Negative is Linked to…

Table 2  Means, standard deviations and Pearson correlations among all measures

Measures Mean (SD) Correlations
1 2 3 4 5 6

1. SEDAS 5.91 (1.32)

2. SDS 3.44 (1.01) − .03
3. DASS depression 1.66 (0.92) .43*** − .31**
4. DASS anxiety 1.43 (0.63) .14 − .25* .80***
5. DASS distress 1.68 (0.73) .31** − .31** .80*** .83***
6. LIWC % positive 28.37 (21.54) − .20* .21* − .21* − .11 − .22*
emotion words
7. LIWC % negative 8.21 (12.09) .27** − .23* .54*** .38*** .43*** − .30**
emotion words

SEDAS Social Expectancies about Depression and Anxiety Scale, SDS Social Desirability Scale, DASS
Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale, LIWC Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count
*p < .050; **p < .010; ***p < .001

Fig. 1  The relation between participants’ perceived social pressure not to feel negative (SEDAS) and the
percentage positive (green) and negative (red) emotion words in observed in their self-concept (according
to the LIWC software). For each variable, density distributions are visualized in the margin. The R-code for
this figure can be found at the Open Science Framework (https​://osf.io/jc453​/). (Color figure online)

13
 E. Dejonckheere, B. Bastian

themselves. Furthermore, SDS and SEDAS scores were uncorrelated, rejecting the propo-
sition that experiencing social pressure not to feel negative and the desire to socially con-
form could be related processes.
Next, we found statistically significant relations between participants’ depression-, anxi-
ety-, and distress-specific complaints as measured with the DASS and the emotion words
used in their self-evaluation. In each domain, higher reported symptom scores were related
with the use of more negative (depression R2 = .288, anxiety R2 = .141, distress R2 = .181),
and less positive emotion words in their self-concept (depression R2 = .044, distress
R2 = .050; except for a statistically non-significant relation between anxiety-specific com-
plaints and positive LIWC emotion words).
Finally, SEDAS scores showed a positive link with depressive (R2 = .180) and distress-
related symptoms (R2 = .093), replicating earlier work on the role of perceived social
expectancies not to feel negative and poor psychological functioning (e.g., Bastian et  al.
2015).2
In a next step, to gain further insight in the link between participants’ perceived social
expectancies not to feel negative and their self-concept, we investigated whether this asso-
ciation was a function of people’s ambition to present themselves in a social desirable way
(i.e., social desirability process) and their actual depression or anxiety levels (i.e., emo-
tional discrepancy process), respectively. To this end, we ran 4 multiple linear regression
models, in which we either predicted participants’ positive or negative LIWC emotion
scores by their SEDAS scores and SDS scores, or their SEDAS scores and total DASS
symptom scores.3 For ease of interpretation, all predictors were grand-mean centered, so
that the intercept in each model reflected the average percentage of positive or negative
emotion words observed in subjects’ self-concept.
As can be seen from Table 3, in the prediction of both the positive and negative emo-
tion words in participants’ self-descriptions, the explanatory power of their SEDAS scores
was statistically significant above and beyond their SDS scores (∆R2 in positive emotion
words = .039, ∆R2 in negative emotion words = .069). While the tendency to present one-
self in a socially desirable way predicted more positive, and less negative emotion words in
people’s self-descriptions, the opposite was true for their perceived social pressure not to
feel negative. This suggests that both predictors have an independent and different predic-
tive effect in the prediction of people’s self-concept, providing evidence against the pro-
posed social desirability process.
When controlling for actual symptom levels, however, we did not find evidence for a
unique predictive link between participants’ SEDAS scores and the valence of their self-
descriptions. In the prediction of the positive emotion words in participants’ self-con-
cept, both their actual symptom levels and the social pressure to avoid negative emotions
became statistically non-significant, which suggests that these predictors explain the same
variance. In the prediction of the negative words in participants’ self-concept, only their

2
 Post-hoc independent-samples t-tests did not reveal statistically significant group differences between
men and women regarding their survey data or self-concept responses (all p’s ≥ .097). Next, however, inves-
tigating whether gender moderated the present relations was not feasible. As the original study was not
designed to critically test for interaction effects, we lacked the required statistical power to perform modera-
tion analysis. Future studies with a larger sample size are needed to conclusively determine the differential
impact of gender on the present results.
3
  Given that we were not interested in the differential predictive effect of specific symptom types, and the
high interrelations among the different DASS subscales (r ≤ .80), we adopted an average symptom score
to operationalize participants’ actual symptom severity. Using the individual subscales, however, yielded
highly similar conclusions.

13
 Table 3  Multiple linear regression models predicting the emotional quality of people’s self-concept
Outcome LIWC positive emotion words LIWC negative emotion words
Predictors β SE t p 95% CI β SE t p 95% CI

Model 1
 Intercept 28.37 2.11 13.46 < .001 [24.19 to 32.55] 8.21 1.16 7.10 <.001 [5.91 to 10.51]
 SDS 4.31 2.10 2.05 .043 [0.13 to 8.48] − 2.66 1.16 − 2.30 .024 [− 4.95 to − 0.37]
 SEDAS − 3.20 1.60 − 2.00 .048 [− 6.38 to − 0.03] 2.24 0.88 2.73 .008 [0.65 to 4.14]
Perceiving Social Pressure not to Feel Negative is Linked to…

Model 2
 Intercept 28.37 2.13 13.31 < .001 [24.14 to 32.60] 8.21 1.07 7.69 <.001 [6.09 to 10.33]
 DASS total − 4.48 3.19 − 1.40 .164 [− 10.82 to 1.86] 7.65 1.60 4.78 <.001 [4.47 to 10.82]
 SEDAS − 2.51 1.71 − 1.46 .146 [− 5.91 to 0.89] 1.10 0.86 1.29 .201 [− 0.60 to 2.81]

All predictors were grand-mean centered

SEDAS Social Expectancies about Depression and Anxiety Scale, SDS Social Desirability Scale, DASS Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale, LIWC Linguistic Inquiry and
Word Count

13
 E. Dejonckheere, B. Bastian

actual symptom levels had a statistically significant and positive predictive value. This sug-
gests that the relation between their perceived social pressure not to feel negative and their
negative self-concept may be driven by their actual symptom levels. Overall, these findings
provide support for the proposed emotional discrepancy process.

5 Discussion

Occasional negative emotional experiences, such as stress, sadness, anger or anxiety

are inevitable, and serve a clear adaptive purpose (Smith and Lazarus 1990). How-
ever, modern Western societies seem to be mostly preoccupied with pursuing positive
affect (e.g., Cederström 2018), while regarding any negative emotionality as unwanted
and dysfunctional (Dejonckheere et  al. 2017). In the present research, we sought to
examine the role of this perceived societal imbalance in valuing positive versus nega-
tive emotions in the way people view or describe themselves. Specifically, we investi-
gated the link between people’s perceived social pressure to avoid negative feelings,
such as anxiety and depression, and the positivity and negativity of their self-concept.
Extracting the positive and negative word counts from participants’ free-response self-
descriptions in a 15-statements test, we found that perceiving social pressure not to
experience negative emotions was associated with a self-concept that was colored by
more negative and less positive emotion words.
Interestingly, this relation was evident independent of people’s desire to socially
conform. While stronger social desirability related to self-representations that were
more positive, and less negative, an unrelated and opposite pattern appeared for peo-
ple’s perceived social expectancies not to experience negative emotions. Although
both processes played a meaningful role in people’s self-concept, these findings sug-
gest that the perception of other’s expectancies not to feel negative does not trigger a
social desirable response in which people wish to present themselves in an overly posi-
tive way in order to comply with the prevailing societal standard.
In contrast, the relation between people’s self-concept and their perceived social
expectancies not to feel negative was function of people’s actual anxiety, depression
and distress levels, which suggests that it is the discrepancy between how we actually
feel and how we think we should feel according to the predominant normative standard
that gives rise to these more negative, and less positive self-reflections (Bastian et al.
2012; Carver and Scheier 1990; Nolen-Hoeksema et al. 2008). Indeed, because we all
occasionally experience negative emotions that deviate from the cultural norm, this
perceived failure may lead us to respond to our own emotions with negative self-eval-
uations. In this way, it is possible that the societal message to pursue positive emotions
at the cost of negative ones, paradoxically aggravates the experience of negative affect
(i.e., secondary disturbances; Bastian 2013), prompting negative self-evaluations.
In sum, the current findings may further add to the literature that describes the
potential detrimental effects of a one-sided valuation of positive versus negative emo-
tions (Bastian 2013; Dejonckheere et  al. 2017; Gruber et  al. 2011). A cultural mes-
sage that encourages a more nuanced embrace of our emotional repertoire could poten-
tially be more advantageous for our mental health and the way we view ourselves (e.g.,
Burkeman 2013).

13
Perceiving Social Pressure not to Feel Negative is Linked to…

5.1 Limitations and Future Research

The current study is not without limitations. First, despite the fact that we were able to
establish meaningful relations between various types of self-report (i.e., predetermined
answers via rating scales versus free-response self-descriptions), our conclusions remain
correlational. Although previous experimental research demonstrated a causal effect of
the perceived social standard to avoid negative affect on people’s psychological well-
being (e.g., Bastian et al. 2012; McGuirk et al. 2018), future lab studies should investi-
gate whether (the perception of) this norm also has direct detrimental consequences for
their self-concept.
Second, individual differences may have existed in the degree to which participants
appraised the online survey context as totally anonymous or not. As such, it remains
uncertain whether all self-statements reflect how people actually view themselves (per-
sonal identity), versus how they wish to present themselves to others/the researchers
(social identity; Turner et  al. 1987). An experiment that clearly distinguishes between
these two types of self-concepts by unambiguously (de)activating the perception of a
social majority group could determine how the perceived social expectancies to avoid
negative feelings relates differently to these two types of self-concepts. Such a design
would allow us to further fine-tune the exact mechanisms through which discrepancies
with a societal standard link up with more negative self-reflections. For example, in the
case of people’s personal identity, the driving force that yields negative self-evaluations
may be the perceived incongruence with an internalized emotion standard. In contrast,
for people’s social identity, it could be the observed inauthenticity towards others that
invokes these negative self-views.
Finally, there are important constraints on generality (Simons et al. 2017) regarding the
sample we selected. Besides the question whether MTurkers are truly representative of the
general population (Arditte et  al. 2016), we emphasize that the participants in this study
were predominantly located in the US, a prototype country for western civilization. The
norm to pursue happiness and avoid sadness is particularly expressed in western individu-
alistic societies (Kuppens et al. 2008), whereas eastern collectivistic cultures tend to pro-
mote a more balanced affective repertoire where positive and negative emotions may co-
exist (Spencer-Rodgers et al. 2010). As such, it is possible that the self-concept of eastern
individuals is less affected by this societal emotion norm (e.g., Heine et al. 1999). Future
studies that investigate the cross-cultural validity of the relation between people’s per-
ceived social pressure to avoid negative feelings and their self-concept could uncover the
universality of the present findings.

6 Conclusion

Perceiving social pressure not to feel anxious or depressed is associated with self-evalu-
ations that are less positive, and more negative. This relation is independent of people’s
desire to socially conform, yet is function of their actual emotion/symptom levels, which
suggests that it is the failure to comply with the desired societal norm that introduces these
negative self-reflections.

13
 E. Dejonckheere, B. Bastian

Acknowledgments The research that led to the findings reported in this article was supported by the
research fund of KU Leuven (GOA/15/003; C14/19/054), and by an Australian Research Council Discovery
grant awarded to Brock Bastian (DP140103757). The authors thank Peter Kuppens for his insightful feed-
back during the research process and earlier versions of this manuscript.

Compliance with ethical standards 

Conflict of interest  The authors declare no conflict of interest.

References
Ahmed, S. (2010). The promise of happiness. Durham: Duke University Press.
Arditte, K. A., Çek, D., Shaw, A. M., & Timpano, K. R. (2016). The importance of assessing clinical phe-
nomena in Mechanical Turk research. Psychological Assessment, 28, 684–691.
Asch, S. E. (1956). Studies of independence and conformity: I. A minority of one against a unanimous
majority. Psychological Monographs: General and Applied, 70, 1–70.
Bastian, B. (2013). Normative influences on secondary disturbance: The role of social expectancies. Aus-
tralian Psychologist, 48, 85–93.
Bastian, B., Dejonckheere, E., & Kuppens, P. (in preparation). Social expectancies about depression and
anxiety scale (SEDAS): A validation study.
Bastian, B., Koval, P., Erbas, Y., Houben, M., Pe, M., & Kuppens, P. (2015). Sad and alone: Social expec-
tancies for experiencing negative emotions are linked to feelings of loneliness. Social Psychological
and Personality Science, 6, 496–503.
Bastian, B., Kuppens, P., Hornsey, M. J., Park, J., Koval, P., & Uchida, Y. (2012). Feeling bad about being
sad: The role of social expectancies in amplifying negative mood. Emotion, 12, 69–80.
Baumeister, R. F. (1999). The self in social psychology. Philadelphia, PA: Routledge.
Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1995). The need to belong: Desire for interpersonal attachments as a
fundamental human motivation. Psychological Bulletin, 117, 497–529.
Behrend, T. S., Sharek, D. J., Meade, A. W., & Wiebe, E. N. (2011). The viability of crowdsourcing for sur-
vey research. Behavior Research Methods, 43, 800.
Brown, T. A., Chorpita, B. F., Korotitsch, W., & Barlow, D. H. (1997). Psychometric properties of the
depression anxiety stress scales (DASS) in clinical samples. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 35,
79–89.
Burkeman, O. (2013). The antidote: Happiness for people who can’t stand positive thinking. Edinburgh,
UK: Canongate.
Carver, C. S., & Scheier, M. F. (1990). Origins and functions of positive and negative affect: A control-
process view. Psychological Review, 97, 19–35.
Cederström, C. (2018). The happiness fantasy. Medford, MA: Polity Press.
Chaiken, S., Wood, W., & Eagly, A. H. (1996). Principles of persuasion. In E. T. Higgins & A. W. Kruglan-
ski (Eds.), Social psychology: Handbook of basic principles (pp. 702–742). New York, NY: Guilford
Press.
Crowne, D. P., & Marlowe, D. (1960). A new scale of social desirability independent of psychopathology.
Journal of Consulting Psychology, 24, 349–354.
Dejonckheere, E., Bastian, B., Fried, E. I., Murphy, S. C., & Kuppens, P. (2017). Perceiving social pressure
not to feel negative predicts depressive symptoms in daily life. Depression and Anxiety, 34, 836–844.
Diener, E. (2000). Subjective well-being: The science of happiness and a proposal for a national index.
American Psychologist, 55, 34–43.
Gruber, J., Mauss, I. B., & Tamir, M. (2011). A dark side of happiness? How, when, and why happiness is
not always good. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 6, 222–233.
Haslam, N. (2005). Dimensions of folk psychiatry. Review of General Psychology, 9, 35–47.
Hattie, J. (1992). Self-concept. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Heine, S. J., Lehman, D. R., Markus, H. R., & Kitayama, S. (1999). Is there a universal need for positive
self-regard? Psycological Review, 106, 766–794.
Insko, C. A., Drenan, S., Solomon, M. R., Smith, R., & Wade, T. J. (1983). Conformity as a function of
the consistency of positive self-evaluation with being liked and being right. Journal of Experimental
Social Psychology, 19, 341–358.

13
Perceiving Social Pressure not to Feel Negative is Linked to…

Khanna, P. (2016). A content analysis of emotional and rational appeals in selected products advertising.
Journal of Management & Social Sciences, 4, 568–578.
Kruglanski, A. W., & Webster, D. M. (1991). Group members’ reactions to opinion deviates and conform-
ists at varying degrees of proximity to decision deadline and of environmental noise. Journal of Per-
sonality and Social Psychology, 61, 212–225.
Krumpal, I. (2013). Determinants of social desirability bias in sensitive surveys: A literature review. Quality
& Quantity, 47, 2025–2047.
Kuhn, M. H., & Mcpartland, T. S. (1954). An empirical investigation of self-attitudes. American Sociologi-
cal Review, 19, 68–76.
Kuppens, P., Realo, A., & Diener, E. (2008). The role of positive and negative emotions in life satisfaction
judgment across nations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95, 66–75.
Lewis, M. (1990). Self-knowledge and social development in early life. In L. A. Pervin (Ed.), Handbook of
personality: Theory and research (pp. 277–300). New York, NY: Guilford Press.
Lovibond, S. H., & Lovibond, P. F. (1995). Manual for the depression anxiety stress scales. Sydney, AU:
The Psychology Foundation of Australia.
Manstead, A. S. R., & Fischer, A. H. (2001). Social appraisal: The social world as object of and influence
on appraisal processes. In K. R. Scherer, A. Schorr, & T. Johnstone (Eds.), Series in affective science.
Appraisal processes in emotion: Theory, methods, research (pp. 221–232). New York, NY: Oxford
University Press.
Mauss, I. B., Savino, N. S., Anderson, C. L., Weisbuch, M., Tamir, M., & Laudenslager, M. L. (2012). The
pursuit of happiness can be lonely. Emotion, 12, 908–912.
McGuirk, L., Kuppens, P., Kingston, R., & Bastian, B. (2018). Does a culture of happiness increase rumina-
tion over failure? Emotion, 18, 755–764.
Nolen-Hoeksema, S., Wisco, B. E., & Lyubomirsky, S. (2008). Rethinking rumination. Perspectives on Psy-
chological Science, 3, 400–424.
Paolacci, G., Chandler, J., & Ipeirotis, P. G. (2010). Running experiments on Amazon Mechanical Turk.
Judgment and Decision Making, 5, 411–419.
Pennebaker, J. W., Francis, M. E., & Booth, R. J. (2001). Linguistic inquiry and word count (LIWC):
LIWC2001. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Pool, G. J., Wood, W. M., & Leck, K. M. (1998). The self-esteem motive in social influence: Agreement
with valued majorities and disagreement with derogated minorities. Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 75, 967–975.
Reinecke, L., & Trepte, S. (2014). Authenticity and well-being on social network sites: A two-wave longi-
tudinal study on the effects of online authenticity and the positivity bias in SNS communication. Com-
puters in Human Behavior, 30, 95–102.
Schachter, S. (1951). Deviation, rejection, and communication. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psy-
chology, 46, 190–207.
Seligman, M. E. P. (2004). Authentic happiness: Using the new positive psychology to realize your potential
for lasting fulfillment. New York, NY: Atria Books.
Sherif, M. (1936). The psychology of social norms. New York, NY: Harper & Brothers.
Simons, D. J., Shoda, Y., & Lindsay, S. D. (2017). Constraints on generality (COG): A proposed addition to
all empirical papers. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 12, 1123–1128.
Smith, C. A., & Lazarus, R. S. (1990). Emotion and adaptation. In L. A. Pervin (Ed.), Handbook of person-
ality: Theory and research (pp. 609–637). New York, NY: Guilford.
Spencer-Rodgers, J., Peng, K., & Wang, L. (2010). Dialecticism and the co-occurrence of positive and nega-
tive emotions across cultures. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 41, 109–115.
Tausczik, Y. R., & Pennebaker, J. W. (2010). The psychological meaning of words: LIWC and computerized
text analysis methods. Journal of Language and Social Psychology, 29, 24–54.
Turner, J. C., Michael, H. A., Oakes, P. J., Reicher, S. D., & Wetherell, M. S. (1987). Rediscovering the
social group: A self-categorization theory. Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell.
Waterloo, S. F., Baumgartner, S. E., Peter, J., & Valkenburg, P. M. (2018). Norms of online expressions
of emotion: Comparing Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and WhatsApp. New Media & Society, 20,
1813–1831.

Publisher’s Note  Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and
institutional affiliations.

13